FALLEN ANGELS
Fallen Angels is a book about a young African American soldier by the name of Richie Perry. He is enlisted and sent to Vietnam. On his way to Vietnam, he meets another soldier, named Gates, who tells Perry to call him Peewee. After they arrive in Vietnam and they are sent straight to the front lines. While they are walking to the front lines, one of the soldiers in their squad, Jenkins, steps on a landmine, and dies, horribly mangled. This is the first time Perry has seen and experienced death, and it deeply disturbs him, especially because the rest of the squad doesn’t react very much. Later, they are assigned to pacify a Vietnamese village, so they distribute medicine and food to the civilians, to ensure that the civilians will side with them, and not the Vietcong. After the pacification, Perry is injured in a firefight, and his injury makes him miss one of his patrols. Because he missed a patrol, he is sent to work with first platoon to make up his missed patrol. While on patrol with the first platoon, they find what they think to be Vietcong troops, and call in an artillery strike. Unfortunately, they misidentified second company as Vietcong, and hit second company by accident. The next major event after Perry rejoins his squad is the burnt village. They are sent to pacify another village, because third squad hasn’t reported back, and they are next in line for the job, but when they arrive, the village is on fire. The Vietcong attacked the village and killed everyone, for the purpose of proving a point to the civilians. The Vietcong are telling the civilians that the U.S. cannot protect them, so they should join the Vietcong. Later, there is a major firefight, and one of the soldiers in Perry’s squad is killed, and Perry himself is wounded. He receives a purple heart and along with his squad is told by the chaplain that they are an inspiration to everyone. The book ends with Perry and Peewee on a plane on the way back to the U.S., thinking about Vietnam.